Ways to Amuse Yourself at the Supermarket Whilst Taking a Break From Being Judgemental

Your Carriage Awaits!

It probably ‘doesn’t do’ for a life coach to admit to being judgemental on occasion, but whilst we’re being honest with each other, you and I, who doesn’t sometimes fall prey to judgementalism?

Being judgemental of others is about seeing the differences between things, rather than seeing the unities, and is probably the biggest problem that we as humanity are working on right now.  You think I’m kidding?  If I didn’t see other people as different than myself, would I condone war in any form? Would I eat to bursting and leave people on the other side of the world hungry? If I didn’t see the earth as being something different to myself would I extract everything I wanted from it and more and give nothing back?  Enough said, and I’ll get off the soapbox. This is what happens when I write on a Sunday morning having read highbrow books and relaxed in the garden all of Saturday!

Well anyhow, there I was in Tesco, browsing the reduced shelf to see if any bargains lurked within (yep, life coach/hypnotherapists do that too – see how many myths I’m dispelling!) and there next to me was an old woman on one of those motorised scooter things.  The kind of person whose eyes you might hesitate to meet. I mentally took a deep breath and bridged the gap. “Sometimes you get lucky” I commented. “Oh yes” she agreed in a voice that was stronger than I expected. “Oh well nothing here for me” I said, about to walk on.  Then I noticed some Sabbath candles and picked them up to see if they were something I could use.  They weren’t. “Oh you’re Jewish are you?” she said “I’m Jewish too.  But both my mother and I married out.  I do go to church on Sundays but I have great respect for the Jewish religion.”  Well what a conversation starter that was!  We stood there for several minutes talking comparative religion, messiahs and the Mayan calendar (really will have to write about that one of these days).  I proposed that everything that existed was ‘of the light’. She said that Richard Dawkins surely wasn’t.  I maintained that even he was, as somebody had to hold the opposite pole (I have Gregg Braden to thank for that idea). I was actually in a hurry – though you wouldn’t think it, with me finding the time to talk with strangers, so I had to make my apologies and go. “Everything is good” I called down the aisle as I walked off “sometimes it’s just hard to see it”.  “Oh yes” she said again and we laughed as we parted.

Off I went, looking for light bulbs.  Don’t you just hate it when the supermarkets move everything around so that you have to cruise all the aisles looking for something that’s been in the same place for the last 10 years! Finally I found an assistant.  He came across as quite dopey … you know, a little, well, ‘David Beckham’.  He didn’t know where the bulbs were and had to ask somebody.  I remember thinking something to the effect that “You really can’t get the staff these days!”  Found the light bulbs and several other bits and pieces and made it back to the tills, running even later than before.

There was the Beckham lookalike on the tills. Ok. But he was smiling, and of course we started talking.  I like to chat with the people on the tills.  It’s a bit of a game for me to see if I can cheer up the glum looking ones, and break up the tedium of the job for them a little.  There was no need to cheer him up though, he was on form. “How much do you think this lot will cost?” I asked him. “Forty three pounds” he guessed. “Ok” I said “I’m going to go with fifty”. He tilled up all my shopping, and it came to forty two pounds and eighty eight pence!  “Wow!” I exclaimed “You’re good, you beat me!”  He leaned over and confided “You know why? Because when I first started to work here I used to play that game – so I got a lot of practice!”  I just had to find out whether he played my other favourite supermarket game. “I know its a little un-pc” I asked with all the excitement of a child “but do you ever play this game: do you ever look at all the shopping on the belt, and then compare it to the person buying it and see if they match?”  “You mean if they buy loads of fruits and vegetables” he started and then we both said “they look healthy” and I added “but if they’re buying loads of crisps and chocolate …” and he finished “they look overweight!”  “Yeah” he said and we both agreed “…and they always match don’t they!” We were both grinning from ear to ear with the mischief of our shared supermarket games as we said goodbye.

As I pushed my shopping back to the car I mused that I had been wrong about him.  Far from being dopey, and I guess rather like David Beckham, he was actually very intelligent.  Intelligent enough to be amusing himself with mental exercises whilst carrying out the mundane task of checking out people’s shopping all day.  “I really must stop judging people” I thought to myself.

I also found myself musing on the idea that you really can tell a person by their daily habits.  You can have all the healthy intentions in the world but if all you buy is crisps, you’re going to be unhealthy.  If you talk about peace but you keep needling people then you’re going to have arguments, and if you like the idea of being rich but you keep buying the latest gadget and don’t actually go and work to support that habit then you’re going to be skint. Conversely, if you buy and eat well on a regular basis, your body will glow with health, if you keep peaceful people around you and work on staying composed when others attempt to ‘rattle your cage’ you will have a peaceful life, and if you manage to arrange your finances so that you spend much less than you earn, eventually you get rich. Simple.  Life is just so simple when you think about it.  Life is just one action at a time. And having fun of course.

Which brings me to another game I play at the supermarket … riding the shopping trolleys. I must admit at this point that most life coaches probably DON’T do this.  Whilst this may conjure up in your mind an image of some wild woman standing rodeo style aboard her wheeled ‘carriage’, waving a shopping list and yelling “Yee-hah!” I am not as yet that flamboyant! I may reserve that for old age, just to tease people.  That and arriving on an elephant and parking him in one of the parking bays, whilst I go in and do my shop.  I’ve always wanted to do that.  Maybe one day. Meanwhile I do like to ride the trolleys whilst I’m shopping – I mean why walk when you can roll! So if I see a clear aisle, and I’m in the mood, I am not above squaring up the trolley so I don’t bash into anything, starting to run a little, leaning my weight on the handle so that my feet leave the ground, and then wheeeeeeeee!  It’s so much faster, and less effortful.  You think I’m crazy?  Come on, loosen up a little and have some fun.  Life can be hard work sometimes, so why take yourself so seriously all the time?  And if you ever see me flying down one of Tesco’s aisles, with a huge smile on my face, don’t judge me, join me!

Have an irreverent, mischievous and judgement-free week!

Rivka